History of Tierra Paisa

History

By Richard McColl

The first tribes encountered in the Tierra Paisa were the Nutabes and their allies the Catíos, neither of which took the arrival of the Spanish Conquistadores particularly well (as evidenced by continuous battles waged against the first capital, Santa Fe de Antioquia.

Perhaps a good reason why Paisas are considered among the hardest working and most resourceful people of Colombia has to do with their Spanish ancestry, which for the most part originated in the poor and inhospitable regions of Extremadura and the Basque Country.

The area was first discovered in 1541 by the conquistador Jorge Robledo, who was responsible for founding the Santa Fe de Antioquia.

The region’s history has since been littered with violence and power struggles, including calls for and acts of independence from both the Spanish Crown and from Colombia itself. Given the wealth they were creating in the region, their motives can easily be understood.

Throughout the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries the economy of the region flourished. It suffered a major setback in the 1970s, however, allowing for the rise of the Medellin cartel that put the city and the region on the map for all the wrong reasons. With Pablo Escobar’s death in 1993 a relative peace settled on Medellin, and the city has since turned itself around.